Hiring a head coach in college sports is almost like putting money in a slot machine and waiting to see if you hit the jackpot. What are the odds of hitting it big? Maybe 50%, which is close to the ratio of success at Arizona the last 20 years.
Tommy Lloyd? Jackpot.
Kevin Sumlin? Empty your pockets.
Adia Barnes? Bingo.
Niya Butts? You’re broke.
Laura Ianello? Collect your money.
Shelly Haywood? Try again.
Sometimes you’re not sure if you won or lost,
Mike Stoops? More of a hit than a miss.
Sean Miller? Started out hot, finished in a mess.
When UA athletic director Dave Heeke had the task of replacing baseball coach Jay Johnson and softball coach Mike Candrea last year, only one thing seemed certain: The pressure was intense not just to get it right, but to hit it out of the park in two of the school’s legacy sports.
Heeke could’ve chased an established baseball coach like Oregon’s Mark Wasikowski. And indeed, there was interest from both Heeke and Wasikowski, who used the UA’s flirtation to land a raise and contract extension.
Ultimately, Heeke hired Chip Hale, one of the sainted names in UA baseball history, a man whose credentials as a Wildcat national champion, major-league manager and coach — he wears a 2018 World Series championship ring — come off as a grand slam.
There was no such anxiety when Heeke replaced Candrea. The two men kept secret Candrea’s decision to retire after the 2021 season. But the advance warning allowed Heeke to research the available possibilities and simultaneously announce he had hired Caitlin Lowe, who not only won a national championship ring as a three-time Wildcat All-American, but also an Olympic silver medal.
Let’s just say it has been a good year for Heeke.
Lowe made more sense than anyone in the game. Heeke went from the heat of his botched football search — he paid more than $100,000 for a search firm to help him hire Sumlin — to being considered something of a savant in the business of hiring a head coach.
Is there any other reason the UA baseball and softball teams combined to set a record for advance season ticket sales? Hale and Lowe stir the blood of Tucson fans, who link them to success. Who doesn’t want to be part of a winner?
Hiring from a school’s Hall of Fame has become more and more in vogue in the Pac-12. Arizona now employs five head coaches linked to national championships or the UA’s Hall of Fame: Barnes, Hale, Lowe, Ianello and swimming’s Augie Busch, who was part of the UA’s unprecedented 2008 men’s and women’s NCAA championship teams.
Arizona softball coach Caitlin Lowe hits the ball while running drills with the outfielders during a practice last week on campus.
If you check the roster of coaches at Pac-12 schools, you’ll find that hiring a successful alumnus or alumna is more popular than ever.
Stanford, which has won more NCAA championships than any school in history, has seven ex-Cardinal athletes as head coaches: football’s David Shaw; baseball’s David Esquer, who was plucked from rival Cal’s staff; gymnastics’ Tabitha Yim, pirated away from Arizona; men’s golf coach Conrad Ray; softball All-American Jessica Allister; water polo’s John Tanner and men’s tennis coach Paul Goldstein.
No one can match UCLA, however.
The Bruins have nine head coaches who know that the “Eight Clap” follows each pep band’s performance of “Sons of Westwood.” If that’s not an NCAA record, it would be a surprise.
UCLA’s head coaching roster includes ex-Bruins softball All-American Kelly Inouye-Perez (talk about a grand slam hire); and coaches in beach volleyball, women’s golf, gymnastics, men’s tennis, track, men’s and women’s volleyball and water polo.
Sometimes you go into the margins, as UCLA did by hiring women’s tennis coach from rival USC. But Stella Sampras, sister of tennis legend Pete Sampras, has credibility far beyond the USC-UCLA rivalry.
Some schools don’t follow blood in the acquisition of head coaches. USC has just one loyal Trojan on its coaching roster: track coach Quincy Watts. The Trojans have head coaches from places you’d least expect: men’s basketball’s Andy Enfield from Johns Hopkins; men’s golf’s J.T. Higgins from Eastern Oregon State; women’s tennis’ Alison Swain, from Williams College, and women’s golf’s Justin Silverstein, an Arizona alumnus.
Oregon has a noble link to Nike’s riches, but only one ex-Duck as a head coach: women’s tennis’ Courtney Nagle. Perhaps the most accomplished head coach at Oregon is track’s Robert Johnson, who is from little ol’ Appalachian State.
Third baseman Chip Hale helped lead the Wildcats to the 1986 College World Series title.
Utah and Colorado have just two ex-Utes and ex-Buffs as head coaches, and one is CU’s women’s golf coach Anne Kelly, a TCU grad who was a girls golf standout at Tucson’s Santa Rita High School. The Utes also have a Tucson connection: men’s tennis coach Roeland Brateanu is a former Arizona tennis player.
The Sun Devils have three powerful names from ASU sports history: wrestling coach Zeke Jones, baseball’s recently hired Willie Bloomquist and Missy Farr Kaye, one of the lead names in Sun Devil women’s golf history. Sun Devil fans seem as excited about Bloomquist’s hire as Arizona’s do about Hale.
Before Barnes, Hale, Lowe, Ianello and Busch were hired across last 10 years — Heeke’s predecessor Greg Byrne hired the latter three, and then hired Arizona swimming All-American Margo Geer to be Alabama’s head coach.
Until Byrne came along, Arizona rarely bought into its past, which seems to have been a grievous mistake.
Over the last 100 years, the only ex-Wildcats hired to be UA head coaches were baseball’s Jerry Stitt and Frank Sancet, swimming’s Rick DeMont, tennis’ Vicki Maes and track’s Dave Murray. Those five coaches were thinly spread over a 69-year period from 1949-2018.
Caitlin Lowe belts a hit during Arizona’s 2006 Women’s College World Series game against Northwestern. A slick-fielding outfielder, Lowe played professionally before returning to the UA as an assistant coach. She was named the Wildcats’ new head coach when Mike Candrea retired.
Perhaps over the next 100 years the Wildcats will celebrate their successes with more familiar faces. Could there be a more promising start than Chip Hale and Caitlin Lowe?
